Foundations of Somatic Mindfulness

Explore the ground of any somatic mindfulness practice. Opening your connection to the earth, full body awareness and spaciousness.

Transcript

In this guidance,

We'll explore the foundations for exploring an embodied somatic mindfulness practice.

We'll run through the different components and different steps that are useful to touch in with pretty quickly,

Knowing that if any of these steps need a little bit more time and a little bit more attention to develop,

You can take some more time with each one,

Allowing yourself to use some effort and use some concentration to systematically touch in with all of these aspects as a foundation to ground any somatic practice,

Whether you're working directly with tensions in the body or eventually just resting in the space of the body,

And allowing your awareness to simply be with whatever arises in that space.

And so to begin,

Find yourself in a comfortable posture,

Making contact with your seat and with the earth.

Begin by simply noticing where your attention is,

And let that attention descend into your body,

All the way down to the ground,

The place where you make contact and connection with the earth.

Let your attention be at the location of the sensations of your connection to the ground.

Allow yourself to feel the support of the earth as you let your body surrender to the force of gravity.

Let your skin soften,

Let your muscles soften,

Even let your bones soften.

The more you surrender and release into that contact with the earth,

Notice that the earth rises up to support you,

And feel that sense of support,

Stability,

Security,

And safety that you get from noticing your contact with the ground.

And then without losing that connection,

Without losing that support of the earth,

Begin to notice the space of your body.

Begin to notice the space of your somatic awareness,

Noticing that there's a sense of spaciousness that surrounds the body,

And simply touching in with all of those directions of that space.

You can begin by feeling the space below you,

So not only feeling the contact with the earth,

But actually dropping your awareness a little bit below that contact,

Feeling a sense of space underneath you.

Noticing the awareness that occupies the space behind you.

The awareness of the space in front of you,

Over on your right side and on your left side.

And then also extends into the space above you.

And like a sphere of awareness that extends outwards in all directions,

Feel the quality of spaciousness that surrounds your body.

And just notice if there's a little bit of a lean or a tug in a certain direction,

A quality of an imbalance,

Maybe it's easier to make contact in certain directions and more difficult to access the space in other directions.

Using a little bit of effort and intention to even out that sense of spaciousness in all directions that surround you.

And so we're now maintaining that tangible sensation of our body making contact with the ground.

A sense of spacious awareness that surrounds our entire body.

Now bringing awareness into the inner spaciousness of the body.

Feeling your legs and your hips,

The core of the lower belly,

The middle of your chest,

Your upper chest,

Letting awareness pour down your arms and into your fingertips,

Into your throat,

And into the center of the skull.

And then feel your whole body.

Notice that your body is a three-dimensional volume of experience.

And that inside that shell of your skin is a whole universe of experience.

And so allow your attention to freely float through the space of the body.

Noticing if there are any areas that feel dull or where there's not as much access to the sensation or the quality of that space in the body.

And you can simply use your breath to breathe some awareness into those spaces.

Noticing where in your body needs a little bit of extra attention.

And on an in-breath,

You can imagine as if you're breathing awareness into that space,

Illuminating what is present there.

And on an out-breath,

You can soften and relax.

Feeling that subtle pulse of the in-breath waking up and illuminating a space in your body.

And actually putting your attention there as you breathe awareness into that space of the body.

And just noticing where in the body you have awareness and where you don't.

And so using some effort and concentration to intentionally breathe into the spaces where awareness is lacking.

And then maybe even spreading your awareness out to cover the whole body and breathe into the whole body.

With an in-breath,

Feel your whole body illuminate and fill with awareness.

And with an out-breath,

Relax and release.

And so we're continuing to maintain that tangible sense of contact with the earth.

That background awareness of spaciousness that surrounds and extends past our physical body.

And illuminating and filling the inner space of the body with our awareness,

Evenly covering awareness throughout the entire body.

And as this as a foundation,

Transitioning either to working with specific sensations,

Specific tensions or resistances that reveal themselves to you.

Or simply resting in the totality of the body.

Letting that space both include thoughts and images.

And simply letting go of effort.

Resting in the body and then allowing whatever experiences want to arise and pass.

Permission to come and go.

And if you find at any point in your practice you feel ungrounded,

You start to drift away from your body,

You start to feel contracted and pulled into a certain sensation,

Losing that quality of spaciousness.

Or you start to get isolated in a certain part of the body and lose the awareness of the whole body.

You can use a little bit of your effort and concentration to just touch in with the different aspects of this practice.

Contact with the earth,

Spaciousness that surrounds,

Full body awareness.

And once you have contact with those qualities,

Engaging in whatever other practice you might be doing from this standpoint as a basic foundation.

And allowing yourself to practice this again and again until eventually you can do it on your own with ease,

Maybe even in a matter of a few minutes.

Reviews

That was wonderful. I just found my new daily practice. Thank you.

Really good, relaxing. Didnt knew it was ended. Let me a sense of awarness all around me, love that. Thank you

Thank you for this basic and beautifully guided meditation. It’s a supportive way to ease into bodily sensations before beginning a regular practice are simply to check in throughout the day.

A nicely composed and delivered guided meditation that would probably make an excellent intro to (one kind of) practice for absolute beginners as well as more experienced meditators. Certainly bears repeat listening, although you may want to skip over the opening minutes after you have heard the intro once.

I have a feeling this recording might also be particularly useful to folks living with dissociation and/or depersonalization (though not in times of extreme distress) because it gently reminds one how to reconnect with the body and the present moment.

I believe this Meditation will be beneficial

Very helpful, thanks very much:)

2nd time for this practice and I’m really tuning into problem areas to send my consciousness to. I’m very intrigued by somatics!

I came to this out of curiosity but it was utter bliss and exactly what I needed today. I look forward to continuing

Thank you. As a somatic mindfulness teacher myself, I found this grounding and expansive, relaxing and calmly energizing. The clear steps create a beautiful full practice as well as the foundation for other somatic explorations. 🙏

So helpful, thank you.

💜somatics 1st time following somatic meditation.felt at ease and calm thank you

Exactly what I needed! So important to practice grounding in our spiritual journey and daily lives. Thanks so much, Danny!

Thanks a lot for this meditation and tools. I feel this awareness that surrounds the body is what is called consciousness. (Don't know how to describe its my experience.) Useful practice to feel what is. It would be nice to have a slower variation of it to practice ...

Excellent introduction to somatic meditation.

Thank You
🙏
Nanaimo

Wonderful. Namaste

Very nice. Will be listening again.

Very good but wish it were longer

I dug my soul's fingertips into the dirt below the bed and below cf the house where I was listening to this. The imaged somatic quality of the fine dirt brought an earth-grounded connection. The dirt's energy filled the empty spaces within that needed to be nurtured, thanks.

Really good!!
Thank you
Thank you
Thank you